Education Secretary must come clean about what he knew, and when Speaking after the Chair of Ofqual told MPs today that it was a "fundamental mistake" to believe a controversial algorithm initially used for A-level and GCSE results would "ever be acceptable to the public", Liberal Democrat Education Spokesperson Daisy Cooper said: The A level scandal caused untold distress and anguish for too many young people. It is now clear as day that the Education Secretary stubbornly refused to heed warnings about this approach and that the decisions which led to this fiasco were firmly in his hands. Pupils and ...
John Snow was my first cricketing hero. He played for Sussex, an affection for whose cricket team is about the only thing my father left me, and he was good enough to win series for England abroad. Here you can see his two best test performances: 7/49 against the West Indies at Sabina Park on the 1967/8 tour of the West Indies (the first England tour I was aware of as a small boy) and a match-winning 7/40 at Sydney on the 1970/1 Ashes tour. A couple of things strike the modern viewer. First, Snow is quick - quicker than ...
One of the key texts in my interest in children and bombsites in post-war British films is The Yellow Balloon from 1953. In that first post on the subject I noted that, while in Hue and Cry from 1947 "a damaged London belongs to errand boys and the film celebrates their independence and resourcefulness," films soon began to take a more equivocal view of the subject. Soon they were was no equivocism left: In The Yellow Balloon (1953) and The Weapon (1956), bombsites are places where terrible things befall small boys who play on them. Part of this, I suspect, ...
I am sitting back and marvelling at the work of ErsatzCulture, who has compiled beautiful Goodreads graphs for all of the major sf awards. You should really go and explore them for yourself. I've been having fun identifying highs and lows for the major awards as follows: Highest-ranked Hugo Best Novel finalist: Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, by J.K. Rowling (2000) - winner that year was A Deepness in the Sky Highest-ranked Hugo Best Novel winner: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, by J.K. Rowling (2001) Highest-ranked Hugo Best Novel finalist of the twentieth century (which ended ...
Browsing behind the London Review of Books paywall, I came across a review of The Cambridge Urban History of Britain. Vol. III: 1840-1950. The reviewer, Andrew Saint, writes: Stephen Royle's chapter on small towns, heavily based on Leicestershire, seems at first to paint a picture of stagnation (Hinckley's 'stinking state' in 1840 etc) and cultural decline. Then abruptly he tells us that Edwardian Market Harborough, a town just short of 8000, boasted Sunday schools, friendly societies for young men and girls, a Church Lads' brigade, a Territorial Army branch, a debating society, a reading society, a choral society, an opera ...
Wed 2nd
19:23
Traffic wardens threaten Ludlow buses with fines - this is nonsense and bad for our town
I was appalled by the scene in Ludlow this afternoon. I just walked out of the barbers - think of it as more like a sheep shearing as my beard was outgrowing my face mask. Ahead of me, buses were crowded into the top of Corve Street. That's normal in normal times. It's more than normal now while King Street closed. Local buses currently operate to and from The Compasses. I was horrified to witness a Shropshire Council Civil Enforcement Officer (CEO) trying to issue a Penalty Charge Notice (PCN) to buses parked at the bus stop on Corve Street. ...
As most children go back to school this week, fears that disadvantaged children will have fallen behind in their schoolwork in the months of COVID lockdown seem confirmed by interviews conducted with more than 3000 teachers and heads at about 2000 schools in England and Wales by the National Foundation for Educational Research. Their study, reported yesterday, found that, while the average learning lost was reckoned to be about three months for all pupils, teachers expect that more than half of pupils in schools in the most deprived areas have lost four months or more. But the educational outlook was ...
Wed 2nd
15:29
PODCAST - That tuition fees promise: what new research shows about the lessons to learn
There was a weird role reversal at the heart of the Liberal Democrat decisions over tuition fees in 2010, as Chris Butler's academic research reveals.
Well done to everyone who took part in the Prestwich Scarecrow Fesival and competition in recent weeks. A special thank you to our local police team here in Prestwich who have worked so hard to make the event work. There were three shortlisted winners who went forward to a public vote on Facebook, with the winner to be announced by the police this week. A fourth place winner was chosen by the Mayor Councillor Tim Pickstone. Top four winners – Toy Story, Little Reader, Jack Sparrow and the 4th place Harry Potter. A handy map of the scarecrows and where ...
Liverpool's Lib Dem Cllrs have asked the Council to respond positively to the Government's consultation of pavement parking but asking it to get to work to sue its existing powers to deal with drivers who park with no concern for ... Continue reading →
I haven't posted at all in August. This is mainly because my wife and I finally completed our house move to a village in East Sussex. We have been reunited with the bulk of our possessions after nearly four months of storage, and we have been unpacking figuring out what to do with them. Then ... Continue reading The world in August 2020: the dance of the Great Powers
Tue, 12:27: RT @RTENewsPaulC: Breaking - @rtenews understands the leaders of the 3 coalition parties have agreed to submit 2 nominees to replace #EU Co... Tue, 12:56: RT @DanielSerwer: On the Montenegro election results: https://t.co/BYjd9KnQlq Tue, 14:57: RT @MalmstromEU: Very honoured to be nominated as Sweden's candidate for the post of Secretary General of the @OECD . Follow my campaign at... Tue, 20:48: RT @ottocrat: I can't make a walk-in appointment to see my GP, I can't book one online, and if I phone I'm played an unskippable 2 minute m... Tue, 21:03: The Fondation Folon https://t.co/z9uZAutxwm #art Wed, 09:30: ...
As if the government have not had enough problems with new technology, the Times reveals that Dominic Cummings' latest diabolical wheeze is to create online "ID cards" for British citizens. The paper reports that proposals announced yesterday will lead to each person being assigned a unique digital identity to help them with such tasks as registering with a new GP. Just how much data would be attached to each 'digital identity' is unclear but there is a clue in the suggestion that legislation could be amended to remove the need for landlords to check tenants' immigration documents. Witnesses would no ...
News of Liberal Democrat selections for the Clwyd West constituency (Welsh Senedd) and Edinburgh Central (Scottish Parliament) constituencies.
The problem with being locked down for a while is that, eventually, you need a change. In the early days of the pandemic, we had the advantage of being in a small village, surrounded by a network of public footpaths. We were faithful to the rules, taking only one walk per day, but making it a decently long one. Indeed, we discovered some routes that, whilst we'd known they were there, we'd never walked before. And, with a mild, dry Spring, we were able to get plenty of fresh air and exercise. Eventually, however, we'd exhausted many of the options ...
Coronavirus cases in Bury remain well above the national average and our local NHS and Council are urging residents to continue to fight Covid-19 together. Full information on the current situation in Bury is here. Information on the local rules in place many parts of Greater Manchester (including Bury) are here. Information about the return to school and eduction in Bury is here.
Wed 2nd
08:30
Whoniversaries 2 September: Eileen Way, Roy Castle, Tomb of the Cybermen #1, The Ribos Operation #1
i) births and deaths 2nd September 1911: birth of Eileen Way who played the Old Mother in An Unearthly Child (1963), the old woman in the woods in Daleks - Invasion Earth 2150 AD (1966) and Karela in The Creature from the Pit (1979). 2nd September 1994: death, two days after his 60th birthday, of Roy Castle, who played Ian in Doctor Who and the Daleks (1965), the first of the Peter Cushing films. [IMG: Ian_(Dalek_movies)[1].jpg] ii) broadcast anniversaries 2nd September 1967: broadcast of the first episode of Tomb of the Cybermen, starting Season 5. The Doctor, Jamie, and new ...
Liberal Democrats join health organisations in warning about PHE shake-up Responding to a joint statement by 70 health organisations and alliances expressing concerns about the reorganisation of public health now underway, Liberal Democrat Health Spokesperson Munira Wilson said: By scrapping the body at the core of our public health response to this global pandemic shows the Government has simply got its priorities all wrong. There are no two ways about it, Ministers are attempting to deflect responsibility from their own mistakes with a top-down reorganisation. Now is not the time to rearrange the deckchairs. Now is the time to listen ...
The Stockfield Road will be closed between the Warwick Road and Wharfedale Road from Friday 25th September (at 7pm) to Wednesday 14th October (at 6am) according to plans issued by the Council. This will allow the road to be fully resurfaced, after years of complaints about potholes. Diversions will be in place during the closure, but major disruption is inevitable at peak times. The resurfacing of this section of the Stockfield Road is long overdue, and desperately needed. It's just a shame it wasn't done over the summer holidays, when traffic was lighter.
The 32nd Dundee Flower and Food Show will take place from Friday 4th to Sunday 6th September virtually, due to the COVID-19 health emergency. The event, which is usually a popular gathering at Camperdown Country Park, attracting in the region of 18,000 visitors, will this year take place exclusively online. Many of the Show's traditional exhibitions will continue, including cut flowers, pot plants, fruit and vegetables, which will now be on display via photographs and videos. Various other familiar sections will be present, as committee members, along with their societies, plant nurseries, chefs, and community groups will be involved. In ...
